Considering it just extended will Tales of The City Transfer to Broadway

Also consider it had the biggest presale in the theaters history and has broken multiple house records and got a really great review from Variety, will it transfer to NYC next season?

review:

ACT's track record with musicals has been sparse and uninspired. So it's a particular pleasure to see "Tales of the City" -- an extremely rare venture into a full-blown, potentially Broadway-bound, world-premiere musical -- turn out very nicely indeed. Lesser results would probably still have given the company a home-turf hit given lingering affection for local scribe Armistead Maupin's beloved San Francisco-set books. But as is, prospects for a commercial future are promising, especially if the ingratiating show finds a way to maintain buoyancy through a second act that lays on melodrama and sentimentality a bit thick.
The "Tales of the City" books (the first two tapped here) didn't necessarily seem a natural fit for this form. Originally serialized in local newspapers, they put a witty contemporary spin on cliffhanger soap operatics with a combination of light satirical wit and constant narrative twists that might well have defied musicalization.

But Jeff Whitty's book and the score by clever alt-rock act Scissor Sisters' Jake Shears and John Garden mostly translate the books' playful yet heartfelt flavor with aplomb.

It's the Bicentennial in 1976, and after five days' vacation in S.F., corn-fed Midwesterner Mary Ann Singleton (Betsy Wolfe) calls her parents in Ohio to say she's not coming back. Her wide-eyed enchantment with the City by the Bay at its height of Me Decade hedonism -- though the latter takes some getting used to -- is abetted when she's taken into the home of landlady Anna Madrigal (Judy Kaye), a pot-growing Earth Mother who clucks over her tenants like a hen over chicks.

Mona gets Mary Ann a job at her firm as secretary to cantankerous CEO Edgar Halcyon (Richard Poe), whose family is "like the Kennedys of S.F., except without all that basic common decency stuff."

She's promptly hit on by the boss's son-in-law Beauchamp (Andrew Samonsky), a seduction chronicled in the sharp "Bolero." But that proves only her first disillusionment.

Ninety-minute first act takes a little while to find its feet on Douglas W. Schmidt's set of snaking S.F.-walkup back staircases.

But Whitty's sharp book and the pleasantly diverse if infrequently memorable songs (referencing '70s disco, Top 40 soft rock and "Hair"-like Broadway "rock" as well as mainstream show-tunery) admirably thread a crowded narrative agenda in terms both spoken and sung. Helmer Jason Moore keeps things brisk, fluid and frequently funny, if not particularly stylish (apart from Beaver Bauer's flashback costumes). Larry Keigwin's choreography, not always distinctive enough, excels in celebration of upmarket gay snobbery "Homosexual Convalescent Center."

After intermission, however, progress bogs down a tad as a pileup of less humorous crises (mostly from Maupin's first sequel tome, "More Tales of the City") trigger several more conventional, heavy-handed scenes and songs. It all ends in multiple reunions and hugs, reminding us that a chorus of hugs is never a good way to end a musical.

Nonetheless, "Tales of the City" is always diverting and never worse than merely imperfect. In its casting, ACT reached well beyond its usual bounds toward experienced Broadway (or at least Broadway-aspirant) personnel, with winning results. Wolfe's Mary Ann, especially, is a naif with a heart, a brain and a big voice. A seven-piece pit band sounds larger than life, and amplification for the singers was terrific on press night.

(sorry copied the whole review because variety is a pay site now) and i feel this give them more of a reason to push for a outside of san fran try out, i do believe though the plan was to bring it to broadway but im not totally sure.

Thanks for the review--it let me access it once but then I guess I went over my monthly limit with Variety (two views a month or something ridiculous). I agree with most of what they say, though I found the score memorable--but then again I'd heard half of it from the demo, and with most musical scores it takes a few listens to sink in, at least for me.

All of the creative team have repeatedly said there's no intention to bring it to Broadway (though they hope for an afterlife), but I also get the feeling that could be just to diminish expectation. Look at all the times shows have promised a Broadway transfer and it just leaves the creators with egg on their face.

I'm getting sick of playing the demo--especially since a good 1/3 is completely different, so would kill for a recording, but I assume we won't see that until/unless at least one more production of the show takes place. Although they could always try to profit on the Scissor Sisters name (and by that I don't mean an album of the group performing the songs...)

Updated On: 6/2/11 at 10:45 PM

Dunno about any of the rest of you, but this looks to me like next year's blockbuster hit.

http://youtu.be/bgReoTDyyd4

Remember: It is not JUST a gay-male saga. It's also a woman's story: It's Mary Ann's story and Mrs. Madrigal's story and Mona's story.

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Updated On: 6/3/11 at 11:51 PM

That said, it's no secret that the show is being shepherded by Broadway producers (McCollum/Seller?) and has been since its inception.

Yes, I meant to say it's NOT just a gay story--it's also a woman's story.

And the more I see the clips the more I like the Mouse. And I like the Mary Ann--I just don't like her wig.

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There may be hopes of a Bway production - and how can't there be - but there is no producer attached.

There's no enhancement money in the show. The production's entire $2.5 million budget was raised by donors to ACT, not investors. In fact, Kevin McCullum was attached at the O"Neill center, but he and the production parted ways.

So, while it may find a producer and go to New York, this prod isn't a try-out and there are no imminent plans to take this or another production to New York.

Don't get wrong, I'm sure they'd like to end up there and since there is no producer attached they are saying they're just happy with this one production, to lower expectations. And I'm sure NY producers will come out, but that hasn't happened yet.

Plus, the development process at ACT has been without any commercial producers. I would guess a commercial producer would have some opinions on the material and probably ask for rewrites of their own, critics notwithstanding.

I guess I'm saying this in the way others correct people for using "Soundtrack" in place of "cast recording." At this time, the production is a regional theatre production with a very popular source material. Whatever their hopes, it isn't a "tryout".

"I've heard some grumblings that Mouse should be more "built" although I don't think the books specify this, but he was def a standout"

Who are those that say this...all the gay men that just want to see a "hot" guy on stage so they can have a wet dream about him later...come on....I think Mouse (Wes Taylor) is built just fine and does his job very well.

Working out may not have been as prevalent as it is today, but Joey, I think there are a lot of photos in pre-1981 issues of After Dark that would prove you wrong...

Oh, he's charming in the part. I sometimes recoil when (usually) gay men feel the need to comment on bodies, nudity, and attractiveness when it's pretty irrelevant. But if we must, he's quite cute.

If it does transfer, it's going to need a LOT of work. There is much trimming and focusing that needs to happen if it has a prayer outside of sf. As someone who is not familiar with the books (as I would assume most of the NYC audience would not be wither), I didn't get it. It all seemed rather pointless to me. There were some nice songs but overall I was let down. Everything was just so formulaic, they really need to futz with the structure and try to vary up each scene because i just got so predictable and completely cheesy.

The storylines that they introduced in the second act I felt could have been brought to the surface a little bit earlier. The Norman storyline was just ridiculous. I thought that whole thing was laughably absurd. Maybe if he was more incorporated into the story in the first act it would have made more sense but it just did not work for me at all.

I know that this has been said but some of the bay area "inside jokes" about marin etc. just won't play in another city. I simply don't see how that would translate.

I know that a lot of people are really digging this show right now, but if it has a prayer outside of SF it's going to nee quite a bit of work IMO.

For sure--and I'm with Brick, I hate how people seem to always have to comment on personal appearance, but if we're going to he was charming and cute.

hpeabody930 I'm surprised you found it so routine. But I do agree with the Norman story and some of the others for Act II. I don't think it needs a *lot* of work, but I do think it needs some. Certainly, to me, it seems in a much more healthy place than a lot of shows in its stage.

It makes sense to bring it to London--Scissor Sisters are a much much much bigger name in the UK, and it prob would play well.